Lexington reports 53 new cases of COVID-19. Deaths lower following record week

Lexington Herald-Leader - 7/23/2020

Jul. 23--Lexington reported 53 new cases of COVID-19 on Thursday, bringing the city's total number of cases to 2,611.

There were no new deaths reported. After a spike of eight deaths last week, the city has had just one confirmed coronavirus death this week, according to data from the Lexington-Fayette County Health Department. There were also four new hospitalizations reported.

The city reported 47 new recoveries on Thursday, bringing the recovery rate up to 73 percent. Dr. Kraig Humbaugh, Lexington's commissioner of health, said Wednesday that the city has continued using guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to determine recoveries.

Those guidelines, which were revised last week, say patients can be considered "recovered" 10 days after symptoms start to appear if they've not had a fever in the last 24 hours without fever-reducing medication. Their other symptoms also have to be reducing in severity, Humbaugh said.

Humbaugh said the CDC doesn't recommend basing recovery on retesting because patients could still test positive even if they are no longer infectious. The guidelines are used for people who did not need to be hospitalized, Humbaugh said. Those who test positive but are asymptomatic throughout their infection period are considered recovered after 10 days, he said.

The focus for these guidelines is to make sure people who are no longer infectious don't have to remain in isolation for an unnecessarily long period of time, according to the CDC's website.

___

Visit the Lexington Herald-Leader (Lexington, Ky.) at www.kentucky.com

Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.